The diagnostic model behind Michael Sabbag's advisory work, in book form. A step-by-step process to find the real root cause of any performance gap, leverage one exemplary strength, develop one expandable strength, and turn both into results the whole organization can measure.
Developing Exemplary Performance One Person at a Time
Going far beyond existing models of performance development, Sabbag provides leaders with both a process roadmap and a practical toolbox for strength-based employee development.
You have hired well, trained generously, and coached patiently. You have watched some people soar and some people stall. And you already know the difference rarely comes down to effort.
Developing Exemplary Performance One Person at a Time starts where your instinct already points: skills and knowledge are one of seven factors that drive performance, and the other six get skipped in most companies. The environment can fight a capable person. The tools can be wrong. The system can quietly punish the exact behavior you asked for. Expectations can live in the leader's head instead of on the page.
The book gives you a working process to walk all seven factors in order, isolate the true root cause, and match it to the smallest intervention that will actually change the result: a job redesign, a systems fix, one-on-one coaching, or, when it genuinely is the gap, training.
Then it goes further than diagnosis. It shows you how to develop each person around two focal points: one exemplary strength worth leveraging harder, and one expandable strength with real development upside. Strength-based, root-cause-first, and tied at every step to the results your strategy needs.
Walk the seven factors model in order and isolate the real root cause, before choosing any intervention.
Identify one exemplary strength to leverage and one expandable strength with genuine development potential.
Apply the targeted solution, engage the person in their own development, and measure the result against the organization's strategy.
Each chapter defines a factor, shows you how to recognize it as a root cause, and hands you the tables, examples, and questions to act on it. Readers consistently name the practicality as the book's signature: a model you can use Monday morning.
Is this the right person in the right seat for the work the role actually requires?
Does the culture around this person support the performance you expect from them?
Does this person have what the job requires, at the standard the job requires it?
Do the workflows around this person enable the result, or quietly work against it?
Has exemplary been defined, in writing, in the same words everyone can repeat?
The factor most leaders check first, and the true root cause less often than it appears.
What this person values, what the work gives them, and how a leader aligns the two honestly.
Reviewers describe it as a reference they return to: a clear definition of exemplary performance that raises the bar from best in company to best in industry, and tables and examples that make each factor immediately usable.
The book defines exemplary performance against the industry's best, and shows leaders how to describe it concretely enough that people can aim at it. Expectations become a shared picture instead of a private hope.
A repeatable walk through all seven factors, with the questions to ask and the evidence to look for at each step. You leave with the actual constraint named, and the intervention matched to it.
Real-world examples, planning tables, and conversation guides for building each person around an exemplary strength and an expandable one, with the individual actively engaged in their own growth.
Going far beyond existing models of performance development, Sabbag provides leaders with both a process roadmap and a practical toolbox for strength-based employee development.
This book lays out a model to help leaders diagnose the real reasons why people may not be performing to standards and allows proper action planning for improvement.
Michael Sabbag is a seasoned, authentic leader with an amazing grasp of the performance challenges facing businesses today. Developing Exemplary Performance is intelligent, practical and easy to understand.
Everything Michael does professionally runs on the model in this book. Read it, test it against your own team with the free diagnostic, or bring Michael in to run it with you. Three doors, one discipline.
The full Seven Factors model, the diagnostic process, and the development toolbox. Available in hardcover and Kindle.
Buy on Amazon →Ten minutes, Thirty-three statements, Eight drivers scored. See how the model reads your executive team today, before you read a page.
Run the Diagnostic →Thirty minutes, honest conversation. Michael will tell you plainly whether the model, and he, fit where your organization is right now.
Schedule a Conversation →The Seven Factors work best as a shared language. When every manager on your team diagnoses performance the same way, expectations get defined once, interventions get matched to real root causes, and development conversations sound the same in every department.
ATD Press offers volume discounts on print orders, and many teams pair a company read with the free Executive Team Effectiveness Diagnostic so the leadership team starts from the same scored baseline.
Volume pricing applies to print orders through ATD Press and is set by the publisher.
Get the model that runs Michael's entire practice, then see what it says about your own team.